Two groups, at King's College London and Newcastle University, have had grant applications to create hybrid embryos turned down, forcing the scientists to consider putting the research on hold. Stephen Minger, who leads the team at King's, was seeking support for a project to create human stem cells that carry the genetic traits of neurodegenerative diseases.

Plans to allow scientists to make hybrid embryos prompted outrage from religious groups who claimed the research was abhorrent. After a lengthy battle, the technique was made legal in the government's new Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act, though researchers are first required to obtain a licence from the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority before creating hybrid embryos and must destroy them after 14 days.

Since the furore broke, however, scientists have developed a cheap and powerful new technique in which adult skin cells are reprogrammed to create cells that are almost identical to stem cells. Researchers have already used the technique to make so-called induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells for patients with diabetes, muscular dystrophy and Down's syndrome. The work was named scientific breakthrough of the year by the prestigious US journal Science last year.

It isn't about the science, just the anti-ethical extremism.
Posted by Orrin Judd at January 13, 2009 9:59 PM